Voltron (Legendary Defender)
Voltron is the legendary defender. He is made up of the five Lions that were hidden away from Emperor Zarkon 10,000 years ago by King Alfor. The five Lions are the Black Lion, the Red Lion, the Blue Lion, the Green Lion, and the Yellow Lion. They were piloted by Shiro, Keith, Lance, Allura, Pidge, and Hunk respectively. Biography In the beginning, a comet composed of trans-dimensional properties crashed on planet Daibazaal, creating an interdimensional rift into another reality. King Alfor brought the comet back to Altea, where he began experimenting on it in his lab, creating five robotic ships in the form of lions. Each lion embodies one of five elemental forces: water, land, fire, sky, and forest. When Daibazaal was threatened by a massive transdimensional alien that emerged from the rift, Alfor introduced the lions to his fellow monarchs, Emperor Zarkon of Daibazaal, Lady Trigel of the Dalterion Belt, Blaytz of Nalquod and Gyrgan of Rygnirath, where they instantly bonded with the Red, Black, Green, Blue and Yellow Lions, and took on the mantle of Paladins. The Paladins then took their lions into battle against alien entity but were hard pressed to defeat it. Suddenly, Alfor had a vision of a mighty robot composed of all five lions combined and he spoke its name: Voltron. Forming Voltron, the Paladins were able to destroy the alien entity. From then onwards, as their alliance explored the universe, Voltron became known as the Defender of the Universe. Eventually, Zarkon called on his fellow Paladins to use Voltron to close the rift on Daibazaal. But instead of sealing it, Voltron merely enlarged it and fell into the rift into the other reality, where Zarkon revealed his true goal to expose his dying wife, Honerva, to quintessence to save her. When the alien creatures responded to Voltron's intrusion, forcing Alfor to lead Voltron back to their reality. Being exposed to an overdose of quintessence, Zarkon and Honerva had apparently perished, so Alfor was forced to evacuate Daibazaal and destroy the planet to seal the rift. Later, it turned out that Zarkon and Honerva were made immortal and pure evil. Desiring Voltron to reopen the rift into the quintessence reality, Zarkon led the Galra Empire against his former allies, catching them off guard. When Altea was the last planet left standing, Princess Allura pleaded with her father to reform Voltron to fight back, but Alfor refused to let the lions fall into Zarkon's hands, so he placed his daughter in cryogenic stasis and linked the lions to her lifeforces. He then locked the Black Lion in the Castle of Lions and scattered the remaining lions to the far corners of the universe, as bringing them together would remove the lock. Alfor then faked Voltron's destruction as he fell in battle against Zarkon, as the Castle of Lions flew to planet Arus. For ten-thousand years the lions waited until the arrival of five new Paladins: five pilots from planet Earth. Components of Voltron While each lion is unique, they each have a few shared abilities. Each lion is equipped with a variety of common functions and abilities. These include speeders that allow them to be accessed from the hangars or used as swift mobile transports in areas inaccessible to the lions, as well as a mouth cannon and a tail laser. Each lion also automatically emits a force field when parked outside the hangars. The force fields are only able to be bypassed by the lion's respective Paladin and their allies. Each Lion is also capable of a degree of sapience, able to communicate with their Paladin via a psychic-like link, revealing their capabilities to them consistently during the heat of combat. Each lion is also capable of superluminal speeds, allowing them to travel unmeasured quantities faster than light. The Lions' intelligence is such that regardless of strength in a Paladin, the Lion itself can weaken a less worthy Paladin's connection to it. This was the case when Shiro deepened his bond with the Black Lion, acknowledging it as his friend and equal partner. This acknowledgment as a sentient being is what influenced Black into suppressing Zarkon's hold on it, as Zarkon did not see Black as a life form, but as a weapon to be mastered and used to dominate all who stood in his way and nothing more. This shows that the Lions actually have more in common with living beings than mere machines, including possessing emotions such as pride, anger, friendship, and loyalty. Suffice it to say that the Artificial Interactive Consciousness of the Lions is arguably one of their most impressive traits, making them more dangerous than unthinking chunks of metal. The Lions will rescue their Paladins if they believe they are worthy enough, such as when the Black Lion saved Keith after his battle with the clone and when the Lions arrived for the Paladins stranded in space. The consciousness of each Lion is capable of uploading the mind of its Paladin in extreme circumstances, such as imminent death. This was witnessed when the Black Lion brought Shiro's mind into its own when Shiro was killed during the battle against Zarkon's mech suit in the Season Two finale. The consciousness can then be transferred by an Altean sorcerer (if they have the skill) into a compatible host body, as Allura did by transferring Shiro's mind into the body of one of his clones. In addition of basic weaponry in form of hand-mounted lasers and shield, Voltron possesses a bayard system which enable it to materialize much more powerful weapons. As demonstrated by Alfor, by inserting a Bayard into any of Lions' bayard slot, Voltron would materialize weapons which depends on the Paladin wielding the Bayard, not the Bayard or Lion itself. When multiple Bayards are combined with respective Lions, the materialized weapon is upgraded into a more powerful form. As the weapons materializes in bluish white light, they are suggestively comprised of Quintessence. Though not all manifested weapons are necessarily alike, the bayard system, coupled with lions' sentience is another testament of Voltron being the greatest and indisputable defender of the universe, with only a few that can challenge its might. Black Lion Paladin: Zarkon (formerly), Shiro (formerly), Shiro (clone) (formerly), Keith (formerly) Component of Voltron: Head, torso Voltron Ability: The wings of the Black Lion can be used to create a shield. The Black Lion's bayard has also been used to amplify the standard sword blade of Voltron into a literal "blazing" sword with intense heat energy output. *The Black Lion was the last out of the set to be piloted as it was hidden on the Castle of Lions, only being allowed to be unlocked after the other four lions were located and brought to the castle. *The Black Lion is able to create a jaw blade as a weapon in its lion form. *The Black Lion is capable of enhancing its wings, transforming them from their simple machine-like design into bladed feathers that allow it to move so fast that it is capable of phasing through solid matter and destroying several extremely large fleets of enemy ships within seconds. Red Lion Paladin: Alfor (formerly), Keith (formerly), Lance (formerly) Component of Voltron: Right arm Voltron Ability: Blazing sword * The Red Lion was the fourth lion to be found out of the set of Voltron. * The Red Lion has the ability to fire incredibly hot beams of plasma from its mouth in order to melt targets like a concentrated blast of flame. * The Red Lion can manifest a three-pronged, back-mounted cannon. This weapon enabled the Red Lion to inflict considerable damage to the perimeter of Zarkon's central hub with only a single shot. Green Lion Paladin: Trigel (formerly), Pidge (formerly) Component of Voltron: Left arm Voltron Ability: Arm Cannon * Chronologically, the Green Lion was the third lion out of the set to be discovered. However, it is unclear whether the Yellow Lion or the Green Lion was found first even though the Yellow Lion is shown being found first. * The Green Lion has been described as being the most adaptive of the lions. This allowed Pidge to install a cloaking device onto it, repurposed from the training room. * The Green Lion can manifest a back mounted cannon which fires constricting vines that grow from the point of impact and ensnare the target. Blue Lion Paladin: Blaytz, (formerly), Lance (formerly), Allura (formerly) Component of Voltron: Right leg Voltron Ability: Unknown * The Blue Lion was the first lion out of the set to be found. * It has the special ability of being able to freeze things when the situation requires it to. * The Blue Lion can manifest a back mounted sonic cannon which can also be used as a sensor device. This sonic cannon is especially effective against aquatic enemies due to sound traveling over three times faster through water than through air. The Baku suffered a sensory overload from the sonic cannon that was every bit as disruptive as the physical damage the weapon caused, illustrating its two-fold fighting power under water. Yellow Lion Paladin: Gyrgan (formerly), Hunk (formerly) Component of Voltron: Left leg Voltron Ability: Shoulder-mounted, multi-targeting cannon * Chronologically, the Yellow Lion was the second lion out of the set to be discovered. However, we don't know whether the Yellow or the Green Lion was found first even though we see the Yellow Lion being found first. * The Yellow Lion is oriented toward defense, favoring armor over speed. Hunk and the Yellow Lion eschew ranged weapons like lasers in favor of melee combat. Only the most durable of foes can shrug off being rammed by the Yellow Lion's heavy frame. Despite this fact, the Yellow Lion remains substantially faster than light. * The Yellow Lion can manifest additional armor plates to further enhance its resilience and the gripping power of its claws. Atlas Voltron With the help of the Balmerans the IGF-Atlas & Voltron were able to merge giving them the strength and power needed to stop Honerva from destroying every reality. Atlas Voltron's weapon is a great sword. Notes * Unlike most versions of Voltron, the wings detach to form a shield. * The individual lions are capable of flying at speeds significantly faster than light, as it only took the Blue Lion seconds to fly to Kerberos. This can be ascertained by the fact that it takes roughly eight minutes for light to travel from the Sun to Earth, and the distance between Earth and Kerberos is far greater than that between Earth and the Sun. On the other hands, it might be just subjective observation, caused by relativistic time dilation. * The fact that the Lions are able to move at faster-than-light speeds without rendering their Paladins into paste in the pilot's seat indicates that Altean science has managed a way to negate inertia on organic lifeforms almost entirely, allowing the Lions to jump to their maximum speeds safely. ** Going with the aforementioned information, due to the forces of inertia on the human body, it would theoretically take several months to over a year for a human being to be able to safely enter light speed and then the same to exit it while the Lions achieve this feat instantaneously with no issues. This confirms that Alteans have managed to master inertial manipulation, which can also be seen by their distinct lack of safety harnesses of any kind in their ships. ** The other possible explanation is that the lions use some kind of non-inertial drive, like Alcubierre warp bubble, and thus remain motionless relative to local space & time. * Despite the five robots being labeled as lions, the roar they emit is actually that of a tiger. * The creators of the series Voltron: Legendary Defender, claim it is so big it could crush the character Optimus Prime from Transformers, like a bug. * It appears that in order to form and operate Voltron properly, the ability to willingly and consciously enter the flow state is necessary. The flow state is a neurophysiological phenomenon where humans and/or other higher mammals enter a state of absolute focus, allowing them to both feel and perform at the peak of their abilities. This state of mind is a universal among human beings, with it being an ability that literally every person possesses. A state of perfect flow appears to be what it also takes to unlock a Voltron Lion's full potential in their individual states as well. * During the fourth season, Pidge upgrades Voltron with the same cloaking ability she used with the Green Lion. However, the only way she can pilot her lion and activate the cloak at the same time is if she has a co-pilot inside Green with her-- namely Matt. Category:Super Robots Category:Voltron: Legendary Defender characters